By Kirti Joshi:
The South-African anti-apartheid revolutionary and politician Nelson Mandela once said that Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.
A survey from the Data released by UK’s National Statistics (ONS) says that India will be the youngest nation by 2020, but the youth literacy rate of India is 82% (2011) which is below world average. If we want the country to produce young entrepreneurs, innovators and leaders, we need a strong education system.
We need to make some changes in the formal education system in India which enables the youth of the soon to be ‘youngest’ nation  to contribute towards the society in a better way.
– Emphasis on learning and knowing about things rather than mugging it for the sake of examination.
The scariest time for a student during an academic session is the time when he/she is supposed to write on a blank paper at the exam hall. Write about things that he/she may not remember for the rest of their life or even just for the next academic session. This is equivalent to climbing the mountain in order to reach the top but without learning and experiencing the process of reaching at the top position. The present education system emphasises on creating ‘Good citizens’ who will obediently follow rules rather than producing individuals through the formal education system who can critique the usual norms/rules set in the society.
– Indoctrinating moral education in the formal education system.
Moral education from school is whatever the school does to influence students’ thinking and acting process. The schools should foster a kind of education which teaches the student to respects everybody. He/she should learn social habits like helping the people, gentleness, respecting the elders etc. which will eventually make them good social creatures.
– The contents of the books should be made in such a way that the student is able to practically absorb the learning in his/her life.
For this we need mentorship by the teachers rather than the conventional style of learning. In the present education pattern, we never learn how to do the bank’s work or why and how do we pay taxes. Students are commanded to make projects that are supposed to be a fun activity, through which they can learn and innovate. In a majority of cases, these projects are done for the sake of completion of a task. We care more about marks because as students, the ‘how many marks will I get?’ question is firmly planted as the most important one in our minds. In this situation, the student will not try to innovate new things, he/she will stop experimenting and will reject even path-breaking ideas due to the fear of losing marks.
Even if India becomes the youngest nation in 2020, due to the lack of emphasis on education system in the present time, this title of being the youngest nation will be of no significance. It is true that India can count several advantages here for being the youngest nation in 2020. A young population would benefit the nation only if the youth is enabled to acquire skill sets that help them in contributing to the society.